'Selena' to play at Cole Park on April 16

Showing of movie is free

CORPUS CHRISTI - What better time to celebrate Selena’s life than her birthday? And city and Time Warner officials will do that with the movie that chronicled her life.

“Selena” will be shown in Cole Park at 7 p.m. April 16, the day the Tejano star would have turned 39.

“She is such a legend and historical person in this community,” Mayor Joe Adame said. “The whole world connects with Selena’s life.”

Everyone is invited to the free event and encouraged to bring blankets and have a picnic.

Vicki Triplett, Time Warner Cable’s communications director for the South Texas division, said she developed the idea as a way to bring the community together.

“It was just kind of one of those light bulb moments,” she said. “What better way to honor a local hometown hero.”

Selena won a Grammy in 1993 and later that year opened two boutiques, one in Corpus Christi and the second in San Antonio. She was working on her crossover to an English/pop career when she was killed March 31, 1995, by Yolanda Saldivar, the president of her fan club, who is serving a life sentence. That crossover effort, “Dreaming of You,” debuted at No. 1 on the U.S. Billboard 200.

The 1997 film about Selena’s life stars Jennifer Lopez and Edward James Olmos. Parts of the movie were filmed in Corpus Christi, including the candlelight vigil at the film’s end.

Triplett said Time Warner will advertise the event to its customers in Corpus Christi, San Antonio and in the Rio Grande Valley.

The Corpus Christi Parks and Recreation Department typically offers concerts and movies in the summer months, but the “Selena” movie event is separate from those events, officials said.

The first concert and movie event of that series will be 7:30 p.m. May 28, officials said.